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The release of Make Your Move starring Derek Hough as Donny and BoA Kwon as Aya has come and gone, yet some fans tend to reminisce. Nothing wrong with that.🙂

Here’s a new poster (to us) that has surfaced. If you were a fan, doesn’t it just make you want to see the movie again? And below, how about watching Derek Hough and listening to the song he wrote, Let Me In?

We found this great fantastic interview with MAKE YOUR MOVE director, Duane Adler, by Mae Abdulbaki from Punch Drunk Critics. In the interview, Duane discusses his transition from screenwriter to director, how it felt directing Derek Hough & Boa in their first film roles, and how writes and envisions a dance scene! Duane also talks about his possible next directing project, which sounds very interesting! We’ve included some of our favorite parts before, but be sure to click here to read the entire article!

You said that you felt you were the best person to direct this movie. Was there another director attached to the project at any point in time?

No. This was something I pitched. I wanted to do an East meets West story. An American boy and an Asian girl. And I felt like tap dance was underutilized as an art form in movies. There hasn’t been a tap dance movie in years, probably since Tap in the late ’80s. I was kind of watching what was going on in Tap and there were some tap dancers and I watched what they did and I was like, “this is really cool!”

It’s very edgy and raw and urban. So I knew I wanted the lead character to be a tap dancer. I was looking for something for my love interest that would really have a percussion element to go along with the tap dancing and something that’s unique to Asian culture. And I thought, “what about taiko drums? Those are really cool, I love those things.” So I Googled tap dance and taiko drums just to see if anybody had done something or was doing anything with those instruments, and I found this group in New York called Cobu.

As a director, how was it working with first-time actor Derek Hough and with BoA in her first English-speaking role?

You know, as a director, I couldn’t have asked for more from both of them and I couldn’t have felt luckier because they were both workaholics. Neither of them had done a movie before. Derek was on the West End when he was 18, but never been in a movie before. But obviously from being on the show [Dancing with the Stars], he was very camera-savvy and very used to working with a lot of people around.

And BoA, she’d grown up around the spotlight, so that part of it was easy for both of them. But the challenge for both of them, and was something that they both embraced, was the work that it takes to be relaxed on camera and to not feel the pressure of having to be perfect every time. Both in the dance numbers as well as the acting. To be able to know that this isn’t live television and that we can take two or three takes. They can warm up into this. They both just went with it and trusted me and trusted the process. We asked an enormous amount of them. They started dance rehearsals five weeks before we started shooting. They lived in the dance studio with the choreographers and the dancers. And they embraced it all and were ready to go.

When you sit down to write, coming from a dance perspective, do you imagine the dance scenes in your head as you’re writing certain scenes?

Yeah. Yeah, I do. When I write a dance scene, I do write on the page a lot describing it. I don’t try to describe the dance moves though. I don’t try to say, “she spins on toes in a three-spin pirouette.” I don’t get into the technical terms, but I try to take the reader on an emotional journey. I ask myself before I write any dance numbers, “what’s the story of this dance?” And that’s where I start. What are the characters trying to express? What are they trying to say? Not unlike how a musical would work, when the character breaks into song, and that’s what’s happening here with our characters.

Each time Derek and BoA dance, we’re furthering the story and they’re saying something to the other person that they’re not saying in words. So I’ll put that on the page and might write

a page and a half, a page, describing that. And then I’d share that with the choreographers and the music department. And Derek actually wrote one of the songs with that in mind. He co-wrote the “Let Me In” song when they do the beautiful duet in the studio. So it’s all really a collaborative experience, but it does all start with what I envision when I’m writing it.

What I didn’t want to do with this movie is make it a dance battle movie. I wanted to make these dances in this movie much more intimate. Much more storytelling. I didn’t want the movie to feel like it stops for a dance number. I wanted the dances to be dramatic and sensual and romantic. Just two characters expressing themselves.

Make Your Move opened in the United States on April 18, 2014, almost three years after the filming of the movie. How did it do?

So far the film has an earnings total of $90,789 dollars domestically, giving Make Your Move a ranking of 38, as of Monday, for current releases. Its total ranking is 9,374 out of 12,600 films. Not too bad!

Below are the four day totals.

Friday – April 18 – $30,089

Saturday – April 19 – $30,438

Sunday – April 20 – $20, 645

Monday – April 21 – $9,617

Foreign grosses from July 2013 to the present are $1,346,000. These figures are totals from 13 countries. Combined, therefore, the worldwide gross is $1,436,789.

Credits to: Box Office Mojo

Make Your Move is an independent film, and “Indies” notoriously do not have big budgets for advertising. As we all know, there was very little commercial promotion of this movie. It is somewhat amazing that it has done as well as it has from mainly word-of-mouth and social media. Choreographers Napoleon and Tabitha D’umo judge the film to have had a successful opening, saying on Instagram:

So much fun doing commentary for #MakeYourMove DVD. Movie did fantastic this weekend. Who went and saw it?

We will have to see how successful the film ends up being. The determining factor will be if movie cinemas continue showing the movie more than just one week, and if other theaters pick up the film to show it in more theaters across the United States.

A member of our team has this to say about the numbers from opening weekend:

I compare [this movie] to a movie I knew about in the late 70s. It was released in about the same number of theaters (142). It only grossed $318,000 or so its opening weekend. The movie is called the “Idolmaker” [1980]. It received rave reviews but very little promoting. I will say this; The amazing performances from Ray Sharky & Peter Gallager in this small film, helped to catapult their movie/TV careers.

“Beast of The Southern Wild” also comes to mind. It opened up to only $170,000 its first weekend. The little girl in the movie went on to be nominated for an Oscar! This was a couple of years ago.

Derek & BoA have received some great reviews, so I really believe/hope their hard work will not go unnoticed.

In Korea, Make Your Move opened on April 17, 2014, and rated 16 in the Box Office rankings. Another successful opening.

As fans of Derek Hough, BoA, Will Yun Lee, Wesley Jonathan, and the other amazing members of the cast, we can do our part to assure the success of this film by making sure that we see the movie ‘in the theater’, and by promoting it to our friends and relatives. Let’s continue our advertising efforts by word-of-mouth. So far, we’ve all done a great job, haven’t we?🙂

Did you know that MAKE YOUR MOVE was Duane Adler’s first time directing a feature film? Did you know that he came up with the concept, wrote the screenplay, and found the two main leads Derek Hough and BoA? MAKE YOUR MOVEis Duane’s baby and we are so happy that the movie has finally been released so that everyone can enjoy this wonderful movie!

The Baltimore Sun published an article on Duane (who grew up in nearby Washington D.C.) Below is an excerpt from the aricle:

“I felt I was the best person to interpret this story — and as a writer, I don’t always feel that way,” says the North Carolina-born Adler, 45, who grew up in suburban Washington, D.C., and Odenton and graduated from the University of Maryland, College Park.” Directing is a different beat. It’s time-consuming, it’s hard. I think you have to be really passionate if you want to go down that road. But this [story] was an idea I had, and I did want to direct it from the start.”

Adler says he’s perhaps most proud of the diverse cast he assembled for film. “Make Your Move” stars Derek Hough, of ABC’s “Dancing with the Stars,” and Korean pop-star BoA. Members of COBU appear in the film, and the supporting cast includes Will Yun Lee (CBS’s “Hawaii Five-0”) and Wesley Jonathan (TV Land’s “The Soul Man’).

Check out this great interview called “5 Ways to Make Your Move with Derek Hough” from Backstage.com! In the article, Derek explains five important things that keeps him motivated in life and career.. and filming MAKE YOUR MOVE! We’ve posting our two favorites, but be sure to click on the link to read them all!

Derek’s special message to fans about ‘Make Your Move’

Go the extra mile. “The character is a tapper, a hoofer, a street performer in New Orleans and I’ve never tapped before in my life,” says Hough. “It was actually one of the things that fascinated me about it and excited me because I knew it was going to force me to learn a new skill.” Although they offered to use stunt feet, it was important to Hough to do all the dancing himself. “I wanted every sound and every movement to be my own, and to be honest about it and to be true.” Hough trained for two and a half months, but luckily, since he was a drummer, picking up the rhythms was fairly easy.

Training gives you freedom. In addition to his dance training, Hough studied theater in London. The training helped to give him freedom in his acting and dancing. “It’s really psychological, and [you learn] about yourself and being honest with yourself and true to how you feel in that moment.” He’s applied this technique to his acting, dancing, and choreography. “Whether I’m doing a routine where I want to move people, or if I want to feel moved myself, I definitely tap into those moments where it’s not just dancing or movement. It might just be a hand gesture or just a slow look, or even just the way you slightly tip your head forward. These subtleties speak volumes.”

Also check out this fun instagram that Derek posted today in honor of the release of MAKE YOUR MOVE. It’s a behind the scenes video at the filming of the video LET ME IN… you can see Duane Adler in there getting some action too! Haha!

We have collected a bunch of movie critic reviews that have been released recently! There are some wonderful reviews, some mixed, some not so nice… =P But most all reviewers had something positive to say about MAKE YOUR MOVE! We’ve included our favorite comments from each review, but be sure to click on the link to read the entire review… and remember, it’s all in the eye of the beholder! =)

Director Duane Adler’s energetic dance flick is bound to be dismissed as a “Step Up” wannabe. But most of that series’ recent sequels were not as good as “Make Your Move.” That’s because Adler wrote the original “Step Up” (and “Save the Last Dance”). This time, he brings an efficient, well-choreographed enthusiasm to an earnest, likable romance.

Director Duane Adler’s film is a celebration of cultural hybridization. Its core dance styles are a wonderfully frenetic fusion of tap and hip-hop and a truly novel blend of Japanese taiko drumming and K-pop girl-group choreography. In an adorable meet-cute, Donny introduces himself to Aya (BoA) by challenging her to an impromptu dance-off on top of a bar. Imagine Fred and Ginger tapping under strobe lights in club gear.

The Romeo and Juliet-inspired plotline basically serves as a framing device allowing the opportunity for a plethora of exuberant dance sequences that particularly show off Hough’s considerable talent. Although it takes a while for the main characters to hook up, Hough’s Donny seals the deal with an impromptu dance duet in which he removes his shirt to reveal his admirably chiseled torso. While the Astaire-Rogers movies used dance as a metaphor for sex, in these modern variations it’s an elaborate form of foreplay.

“Make Your Move” has an underlying sweetness that serves it well. It understands the need for community, for expression, for family. It’s kind to its characters. It features a diverse cast, accurately reflecting the dance world and its inhabitants. Adler and Middleton know that when we come to a dance movie, we want a chance to see, really see, those dances. They find a way to do just that.

Duane Adler, the writer of “Step Up” and “Save the Last Dance,” capably directs “Make Your Move,” a soapy, flashy confection that juxtaposes Mr. Hough’s tap dancing with the Japanese drumming style Taiko, tossed with liberal helpings of contemporary hip-hop moves. Mr. Hough, a “Dancing With the Stars” champion, impresses with his footwork and sufficiently fulfills his romantic-lead duties. BoA is cute and appealingly impudent, but a bit more remote.

Hough is athletic as Gene Kelly and has the beautiful lines of Fred Astaire. His beautiful spins and turns and dynamic lines outclass BoA whose hip hop is good, but not as high a level as the crews on “Step Up: 3D.” Napoleon and Tabitha Dumo’s choreography matches Hough and BoA’s disparate talents into a lyrically romantic duet sequences. Gregory Middleton’s atmospheric cinematography makes grunge look glamorous and fills us with the golden light of possibilities including multicultural friendships and romance. “Make Your Move” isn’t a great movie but feature wonderful dance sequences and maybe the first step for Derek Hough into musical stardom. Please someone give Hough a Gene Kelly or Fred Astaire musical and find him a Ginger Rogers.

The sexual tention betwen Donny and Aya is hot, and if you’ve seen the trailer, you’ve probably seen the dance sequence where Donny and Aya dance/undress before their sexual encounter. The way Donny takes off his shirt is HOT!! I really enjoyed covering Make Your Move! From the red carpet, to the screening, to the fabulous after party, it is a great film, with a great director and cast, and I can’t wait to hear what your thoughts are on Make Your Move!

Here is a film that truly believes in America and the spirit of diversity upon which this country was founded; its unfortunately infrequent dance sequences depict young people moving, in a guileless effort to move young people. BoA’s cultural dexterity emerges as her most evident gift—Make Your Move takes full advantage of her fame as the only Korean artist to have two separate million-selling albums in Japan (particularly impressive given the fractious history between the two countries). The film foregrounds BoA’s multi-lingual fluency, not only overlooking her mild difficulties with English, but also openly celebrating her worldliness as proof of her right to remain in America as a true New Yorker.

This is a wonderful review for MAKE YOUR MOVE by Sheila O’Malley, who writes movie reviews for RogerEbert.com! If you remember, Roger Ebert was a beloved movie critic for many decades. We love how Sheila is truly a fan of dance and the art of the dance movie. Read the excerpt below, but be sure to read the full review here!

Written and directed by Duane Adler, who wrote the screenplay for the original “Step Up,” “Make Your Move” has a pretty complicated plot, involving corporate sponsorship, event planning, career moves for dancers, visa and immigration issues, not to mention various family dramas and burgeoning romance. It’s a lot to absorb. But a movie like “Make Your Move” rests on the success of its various dance sequences, not its plot. And the dancing here is exciting, innovative, and specific. Each “number” has a story behind it, a motivation, a different look and feel. Adler and his cinematographer Gregory Middleton chose to film much of the sequences using full-body shots, the camera moving with the dancers, giving us a chance to see the dancers in action, moving through space. Oftentimes, with dance movies, the camerawork and editing choices cut away from the full body, showing us different parts and gestures, trying to generate a sense of excitement and movement through the editing. It can be frustrating, especially if you grew up watching Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers: “Let me see the whole dancer!” “Make Your Move” shows us the whole dancer. These sequences really move in a way that feels organic.

“Make Your Move” has an underlying sweetness that serves it well. It understands the need for community, for expression, for family. It’s kind to its characters. It features a diverse cast, accurately reflecting the dance world and its inhabitants. Adler and Middleton know that when we come to a dance movie, we want a chance to see, really see, those dances. They find a way to do just that.

The best way to help MAKE YOUR MOVE become successful (besides taking all of your friends & family to see it this opening weekend!) is to write a review of the movie on the movie websites below. We know that Derek Hough and BoA fans will enjoy this movie, but people who are on the fence about seeing the movie in the theaters might check out the reviews written by others… so let’s convince them to see it!

You might have to make accounts to post reviews for MAKE YOUR MOVE, but it will be such a big help if you can share your positive thoughts about the movie. Please try to write at least a little something on all of the websites listed below. Derek, BoA, Duane, Nappytabs, and everyone on the MAKE YOUR MOVEcast and crew worked SO HARD on this movie, so let’s support them every way that we can!

We absolutely love this exclusive behind-the-scenes video that was released by Seventeen Magazine! In the video, we get a little inside look of how the dance scenes were created and the diverse music was incorporated into MAKE YOUR MOVE. We get nice interviews from Duane Adler, Derek Hough, BoA Kwon, Napleon and Tabitha D’Umo, and Yako Miyamoto!

In case you missed it, here is the list of cities showing Make Your Move this weekend.

Also, below are the listings of the theaters. In the STATUS column, CFN means confirmed, TEN is “tentative”, meaning not yet officially booked. Check the links below to determine if the movie has changed from tentative and confirmed.

Also, you can always check the links to see if there is a theater closer to you that is not on this list. Please continue to check Fandango or your preferred movie website for updated information on movie showings and whether or not Make Your Move is playing at a theater near you. Some people are reporting that they were able to buy tickets for theaters not listed here.

[Editor’s note: This movie is principally being shown in 2D, a limited number of theaters are showing it in 3D.]

This link is being continuously updated, or you can try the links below by submitting your zip code in the search box.